This invention relates to air heating furnaces and more particularly to a forced air-type of furnace adapted for home heating purposes.
Generally, forced air heating furnaces installed in private homes and residences, are limited in use to a single type of fuel whether it be a coal or wood fired furnace or a fluid fuel burning furnace utilizing a liquid or gaseous fuel. While liquid or oil and gas fired furnaces have been generally adopted in recent years as the central air heating plant for homes and residences, the more current energy problems and fuel shortages have induced builders to look toward other types of furnaces capable of being fired by solid fuels that are more plentiful. Because of the uncertainties that have arisen with respect to the availability and cost of fluid and solid fuels, it would be desirable to provide a central heating furnace that is capable of being fired by either or both types of fuels.
Fuel fired heating plants capable of utilizing either fluid or solid fuels, have heretofore been proposed as disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,113,379, 1,508,393, 1,840,306, 2,848,958 and 3,066,655. Usually, such prior fuel fired heating plants either embody separate combustion chambers for the different types of fuel or require a substantial change over procedure to convert it from one type of fuel fired heating plant to another type of fuel fired heating plant. It is therefore an important object of the present invention to provide a fuel fired heating plant of the forced air type employing a single combustion chamber within which both fluid and solid fuels including wood may be burned.
An additional object in accordance with the foregoing object is to provide a heating plant that requires no structural change or change over procedure in order to convert it from a fluid burning furnace to a solid fuel burning furnace, with both types of fuels capable of being burned simultaneously.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a central heating plant of the forced air type wherein a fluid fuel burner is utilized for ignition of a solid fuel with burning of both fuels occurring within a common combustion chamber in an efficient manner with facilities for handling either type of fuels.